Chrome apps coming to iOS and Android devices

Last time I’ve heard there were no shortage of iOS and Android apps. Google, apparently, disagrees with this as it has decided to launch a conversion tool that uses Apache Cordova to allow Chrome’s HTML5-based apps to run on two of the world’s most popular platforms.

We’ve already mentioned this service in the past and now it’s pretty much ready for prime time, allowing more people to step into the app-making craze. No longer will you be required to learn the Xcode or Java — HTML5, CSS and JavaScript coding is all it takes to join the fun.

According to Google’s software engineer Andrew Grieve, the Cordova toolchain “provides a simple workflow for extending the reach of Chrome Apps to users on mobile platforms.”

Sure you could’ve used web-based technologies in the past relying on other third-party solutions, but this time it comes from Google, pretty much guaranteeing the popularity of the tool.

The question remains whether we need HTML5-based apps. Perhaps in the future most apps will be built using web standards; in the meantime, we keep preferring the “true” native app experience.